From: Brett Paatsch (paatschb@ocean.com.au)
Date: Sat Mar 08 2003 - 19:00:18 MST
Lee Daniel Crocker writes:
> First of all, let's change the rules: the burden of proof is on
> those who wish to support patents, not those who wish to
> remove them, because freedom should always be the default.
.
> Patents reduce freedom.
.
The notion that freedom or the extension of freedom should
always be pursued is an interesting but paradoxical one.
Seems individually and collectively we (humans) are only
ever free within bounds. In another way as I think Sartre put
it we are condemned to be free. Choices and the imputing
of meaning on an essentially meaningless universe falls to us
individually and collectively. Part of the process of personal
development for social creatures like us is acquiring (and
sometimes surpassing) the contemporary constructs that
constitute the prevailing social constructions of reality. In one
sense we (humans) have more freedom than many of us
(humans) can handle. We construct edifices to cut down
these freedoms to what we can deal with. We
anthropomorphise. We create gods, we label Nature, we
invent consciousness. And some of us need to cut these
down more than others. But then we all eat, sleep and the
rest in a material world. And no amount of jumping dreaming
or wishing separates us from the material substrates on
which our consciousness currently resides so we must
prioritise. For even dreaming of extending freedom is an
exercise pursued by mortals within the contingency of time.
At one level, like, it seems to me anyway, most intelligent
people, I support free speech, free association, freedom
of religion (and from these things which give rise to
paradoxes in itself - where does one groups right to religion
impede my right to be free from their religion) but it often
seems to be forgotten that these freedoms are asserted
against a perceived arbitrary or changeable limitation they
are not really sensible when asserted as absolutes.
The argument for free speech as I understand it to have
been put by the likes of Mills and Voltaire was essentially
an argument made within the confines of particular societies
by persons aspiring and working for better societies (and
perhaps sometimes more specifically for societies that would
be better for them).
But constraints on our freedoms come from a number of
sources and ultimately it is not merely the tyrannies of societies
that constrain us, it is also the contingent nature of a broader
than social reality.
Reality is in part a social construct yes, but that's not the whole
story. The universe presents to us individually as well. Individuals
can practice a scientific way of looking at the world and
individuals can and do think for themselves. 1 +1 = 2 regardless
of what society says on the matter though society can change the
words it cannot intercede between the mind of the individual and
their apprehension of the core concepts.
And there is no appeal that can be made that will make one and
one make other than two. Freedom has limits that are not
merely social limits. There are some truths and these are not
further reducible or deniable. Contingency exists in the universe
and therefore freedoms are finite in certain dimensions. We may
perceive no "roof" and therefore no total volume of freedom is
fixable but there are "walls" that are real in more than a social
sense.
Brett
[Must be the rant I have when I'm not mentioning the war. ;-) ]
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Sat Mar 08 2003 - 18:38:34 MST